King and Queen!

We attended Rowan's birthday party recently. Rowan is DS's classmate and friend. :) The kids had a wonderful time and they left with "crowns", kindly knitted by Rowan's mummy. They fit perfectly! Thank you, Aunty Vivienne!!! DS and DD have been spending their time playing "King" and "Queen". :)

Custom-Made Wetsuits

The kids' custom-made wetsuits are finally ready. They chose the colors themselves. DD, of course, wanted pink. Yep, her favorite color is pink. She says she wants a pink car when she grows up, and for now, she'll like me to buy her pink dental floss (!!!), pink tissue paper, and pen with pink ink.

We also got DD some arm floats since she's just a dare-devil in the swimming pool. She loves plunging into the water and "swimming" like her big brother.

Here's DS with his swim-mate Colette, and our estate's favorite swim coach, Xavier.

Here's DD trying on DS's goggles when he wasn't looking. She has been asking me to get her a pair of goggles too, in pink color, of course! But I still don't think there are goggles made in her size!

And here she is, thinking that she's got the goggles on correctly. :)

The Emergence of the Final Consonant S

DD talks a lot, but many people have difficult understanding her. It's because she makes many articulation errors that are normal for someone of her age. This means that she may leave out certain sounds in words when talking. For instance, she may pronounce the word "bread" as "bad" and the word "telephone" as "teh-phone".

The final 's' sound, i.e. the 's' sound that is at the end of a word, has been consistently omitted by DD as she cannot yet pronounce it when it's at the end of a word. For example, "bus" will become "ba", "nice" will be "ny" and "rose" will be pronounced "row".

But since Saturday, she has been able to pronounce her final consonant 's'! Yipee!!! :) This is very exciting for me as I have been awaiting the day that she can do this. OK, this is obviously a hazard due to my professional background, but almost everytime DD talks, my mind automatically compiles the errors that she makes and the sounds that she's able to produce. It used to be worse when I was in Uni. I used to phonetically transcribe people's speeches as they are talking.

Below is a video of DD taken a month back. That's where the kids do most of their reading (just kidding!!!). See if you can make out the story that she is reading. :) The book is "The Very Hungry Caterpillar".

Exercising with Papa

The kids just love to do whatever we adults do. DS has been wanting to exercise so that his muscles will "grow bigger". Hehe.

DS's First Swimming Lesson!

DS has been waiting for this for a long long time. But, most swimming instructors in Singapore only take students from age 5 onwards. Younger than that and you'll need to seek out specially-trained swim coaches (who charge more and frequently won't travel to our swimming pool). So after a long wait, DS, who turns 5 next month, finally gets to start swimming lessons in the comfort of our own condominium pool and with his favourite swim coach, Uncle Xavier. Not that he knows of any other swim coach. :P

Here he is, all excited. He's also warm and toasty, thanks to my friend Vivienne, who lent us her son's wetsuit. DS's custom-made wetsuit will be ready for him next week!

With DS is his swim-mate and playground friend, Colette. :)

Grandpa and DD watching from the side. DD kept asking when it would be her turn to go into the water. (After Mummy finishes taking pictures, of course! Hehe!)


And finally, we have a kick-off!!! :)